Fall Out
by Liz Williams
Summary: Post Unbearable


"Well this can't be good," Sara joked as she opened her apartment door. She's been curled up on the couch reading a book. For once her reading material hadn't been a journal, textbook or crime novel, it had been a book Greg had lent her.

"You'll love it!" He had thrust the book at her as he'd left at the end of shift.

"_Good Omens_? You've got to be kidding me Greg!"

"Hey don't judge a book by its cover or its title. It's a good book, a fun read and interesting, snarky and not what you're normally into. Give it a chance." He had looked so hopeful, so enthusiastic that it would have been like kicking a puppy. So she had smiled and taken the book from him hoping that the book wouldn't bore her to tears or repulse her. Greg read some strange things.

The book was about three quarters done when the knock at her front door had interrupted her. Greg was right it was a great read.

Grissom was just staring at her and Sara was beginning to feel self-conscious. She was so not ready to have a repeat of the last time he was here.

"Do, ah, do you want to come in?" Grissom eyes seemed to be searching her, but for what Sara had no idea. Deciding he could come in or not she left the front door open and walked into her kitchen to make herself a cup of tea. Filling the kettle with enough water for two, she then plugged it in.

As she pulled two mugs from her cabinet she heard the front door close softly behind her. There was no indication if Grissom was on this side of it of the other. Bracing herself, though not entirely sure for which option, Sara turned around.

He was standing in front of her fridge.

It was then that Sara realized he was still wearing the same clothes he had on during shift, but their shift had ended almost three hours ago. His car had been pulling out as she had been exiting the building.

Sara was desperately fighting for control over the urge to run away, start over talking, or go to her room to change out of the tank top and loose sweat pants that made up her winter sleep wear.

Dammit, he had come here, again, it was his turn to talk. The kettle started to whistle, startling both of them. Sara blushed as she realized they had spent somewhere in the neighborhood of two minutes just staring at each other.

"I going to make myself some mint tea, do you want any?" She pulled the box of Sleep Time from the shelf, not looking at him as she went about making her own mug of tea.

"Yeah, that would be nice. However, if you want me to leave before I finish it, I will." His words froze her for a moment, but she kept moving. She always tried to keep moving, you were a harder target to hit if you kept moving. And the most painful hits had nothing to do with physical contact.

Handing a steaming much to Grissom she made her way over to the living room, curling up in the chair in much the same way she had just over a week previously. Grissom took the couch, setting his tea down on the coffee table. Taking care to set the hot mug down on one of the journals, rather than the finished surface.

"I wanted to tell you, before you heard it from anybody else. To explain. I don't want. It wasn't-" Grissom took his glasses off fiddling with the ends, before setting them down next to his tea. "I went out to dinner with Sophia after shift tonight."

Sara's whole body froze. She actually went numb; she could feel it starting at her head and flash the rest of the way down to her feet. Who knew he could still hurt her this much. Wait, no, this was a wholly new level of pain that she wasn't feeling yet, but one that she once it hit her would hurt worse than anything else he had ever done.

Grissom must have noticed how still she had become, her tea mug was balancing precariously on her knee, yet she did nothing to stabilize it. Out of her peripheral vision Sara saw Grissom's had coming towards her and she recoiled away. The movement caused some of the still hot tea to slosh over the side.

"Sara!" Grissom grabbed her mug, placing it haphazardly on the magazine next to his own. "Are you burnt? Honey, let me see."

It was funny what pulled you out of shock, what put the first crack in the peaceful numbness and let all the pain hit you at once. Her thigh burned where the tea had landed, but Sara was pretty sure it was just a minor burn. A red mark that would be gone by the start of next shift.

The pieces of her soul were another matter.

"It's nothing Grissom. I want you to keep your word, I want you to leave." She was amazed at how calm she sounded, how in control. Funny that. She wondered where her control was last week when she had cried in front of him, no sobbed, for what felt like hours.

Well, Ecklie would be happy. The letter of resignation that she had never deleted from her computer would be sitting on his desk as soon as she could be reasonably sure she could get it there without having to see the odious man. She would need to change the date on the top, though not by much.

Why was Grissom still here?

"I'll leave, but I just want you to know it wasn't a date. I was, she's not happy. She's-" Again, he stopped midway through his thought, or perhaps thoughts, plural, was a better description. Since showing up this evening, Grissom had been even more laconic than normal.

Sara wasn't in a mood to be helpful at all. She just wanted him to leave so she'd change her pants, finish her tea and try not to cry herself to sleep over him. Again.

"Look Grissom I really don't care what it was. Actually that's not true, obviously I care a hell of a lot more then I'm supposed to, but frankly I can't deal with it tonight. Just go."

Her PEAP had been so wrong, talking to Grissom about her feelings, about her past was not going to help her. Leaving on the other hand was. To hell with not dealing with her problems, sometimes it was just better to start over.

If he wasn't leaving she was. The sweat pants were clinging to her unpleasantly so Sara decided that she was going to change pants, take a look at the burn on her thigh and lock herself in her bedroom. And Grissom could go to hell.

Standing up to carry out her plan, Sara was surprised to feel Grissom's had grasp her bare arm. His grip wasn't tight to leave a mark, but it prevented her from pushing past him.

"Sara," his voice was low and urgent. "The reason I came here was to tell you face to face that I had been out with Sophia. I didn't want you to hear about it from anyone else and get the wrong idea. I asked her out for dinner." Sara flinched again and briefly struggled to get free, but Grissom was much stronger then she was and seemed just as determined to make her stay and listen as she was to go and hide. "The reason I asked her out was because she came to my office tonight. She sick of the politics at the Lab, pissed as hell about her demotion. Sara, she's leaving."

"So I guess the price of keeping your employees had gone up. Either that or I'm only worth a plant." Sara could hear the bitterness dropping off every word, but she just didn't have the energy to even try for any form of subterfuge.

Sara wasn't sure of what the significance of Grissom's words were, except that if Sophia was in fact leaving that meant one of two things; Grissom and Sophia would be free to pursue any feelings they had for each other, and that she really didn't think she could survive watching them.

Grissom had not let go of her arm, but shuffled around so that he was now facing her. His right hand came up to her grasp her left elbow securing her.

"She and I had a long chat about Ecklie, office politics, and the best way to get what you want without rocking the boat too much." Grissom took a deep breath. "I'm not sure where Catherine's loyalties are any more. She's been getting pretty cozy with Ecklie since she took the swing shift supervisor position. Without her to take most of the political garbage, I needed someone I could ask for help who wouldn't be pushing their own agenda." Grissom's thumb had started to rub the inside of Sara's elbow it was distracting. Her body was sending all sorts of messages that her brain and heart were fighting against. She could not trust him again.

"It's really not my business what you do on your off time. You've made that more than clear." And still his thumb kept moving. His left hand slowly slipped down to encircle her right wrist. Both hands had loosened and a voice in the back of Sara's mind was screaming at her to run, that she could break his hold easily now. Another voice snorted in derision at that thought, breaking Grissom's hold would never be as easy as just pulling away from him. If it was she would have left years ago, hell she might not have ever come to Vegas in the first place.

"I needed someone who is good at politics to bounce some ideas off of. I burned some bridges last week, made my stance very clear to Ecklie and now I needed to make sure that when he confronts me about it, as I have no doubt he will at a future date, that I will have what I need to keep what is most important to me."

Damn it! She was listening to him, he was winning her over, making her anger go away. This was not how it was supposed to be, why couldn't she ever stay mad? Mad was so much easier then the pain that inevitably followed in its wake.

"Sara please, please. I came here as soon as we were finished to tell you. I know that it would be better coming from me in private then in passing from someone at the Lab." He was looking at her, straight at her unblinking, unwavering. "I don't want to be the cause of any more of your pain. Please." The last was almost whispered.

Sara pulled her arms and this time her released her. As he did he seemed to deflate, shoulders slumping, head dropping down to examine the patterns on her floor.

"Finish your tea Grissom. I'm going to put on a dry pair of pants." Slowly she made her way to her bedroom pushing the door closed behind her without enough force for the door to latch shut.


End file.
